A Man for All Reasons

Geekish

Anyone who works as a freelancer these days has to be at least a bit familiar with techie things. But it isn’t just that. When I was a kid and those vaguely SF puppet shows were on the television and all the other kids wanted to be Greg Gogetem or Steve Savetheuniverse, I wanted to be the guy in a white coat and glasses called Doc or Brains. Here are some technology-related feeds I find useful and/or entertaining.

It appears that hackers who breached Sony?s networks last year absconded with more than just the personal information of millions of Sony Play Station users. They also stole more than 50,000 music files, including Michael Jackson?s entire back catalogue of published music, as well as previously unreleased tracks. [Link]

Preschool helps prime malleable young minds to develop with relative ease. But why do children in socioeconomically deprived homes get so much more value from such an education? Frontal Cortex blogger Jonah Lehrer shares the surprising results of a new twins study. [Link]

Gaining control of your mobile data usage is the key to avoid running into data caps, throttling and overage charges. As an added bonus, by cutting back on the amount of data your smartphone or tablet passes around over your provider's network, you're likely to gain a bit of extra battery life too. [Link]

MrSeb writes "Three years ago today, AMD spun off its fab division, in a move the company claimed would allow it to more effectively leverage its assets, inject new capital into the foundry side of the business, and make it more competitive vis-à-vis Chipzilla. Today, that dream is dead. AMD announced today that it would give up its 8.8% … [Link]

AMD is shedding its stake in GlobalFoundries, the semiconductor foundry that it spun off in 2009. Initially, AMD used GlobalFoundries as its sole manufacturer, but it has increasingly turned to other companies such as TSMC after GlobalFoundries struggled to build working chips on its 32nm process. [Link]

A new research report commission by Microsoft finds that 14 million jobs will be created by 2015 thanks to cloud computing, but about half of the new jobs will be in India and China. Should we feel good about this report? Is it fair to extract the cloud as job creator without considering its net effect? [Link]

Facebook is exploring a technology that controls temperatures in the data center by automatically moving software workloads among servers according to the air pressure on either side of each machine. [Link]

While considering market tie-in products to promote the upcoming Spider-Man film, someone was clearly thinking outside-the-box. It appears that former dental supply company turned glamourous nail polish and acrylic nail supply company OPI has come out with a line of Spider-Man nail polish!I honestly wonder if there is a market out there to tie in a comic book superhero to nail … [Link]

Sparrowvsrevolution writes "Boston Dynamics, a Waltham, Massachusetts technology firm and DARPA contractor, announced Monday that it's broken the speed record for running, legged robots. Its new four-legged creation is Cheetah, a robot that can run at 18 miles an hour, far faster than the 13.1 miles per hour record set by MIT in 1989. The video it's released shows … [Link]

For the first time, the government explained why it believes it has the legal authority to kill U.S. citizens suspected of terrorism while they're overseas, without providing them with a process to contest their killings. Only Attorney General Eric Holder's landmark speech on Monday posed more questions than answers. [Link]

Maddog Batty writes "Dave Gorman, UK comic and Flickr user, recently received a DMCA takedown notice for one of his own pictures which had become rather popular — 160,000 views + lots of comments. The takedown was in error (from a porn company) and Flickr allowed him to repost the image. However, the fallout is that all the original … [Link]

18th Century North America. After more than 20 years of conflict, the 13 American colonies and the British Crown are on the brink of all-out war. Battle lines are drawn. Bloodshed is inevitable. Out of the embers of his burning village, a new assassin will rise. Born of Mohawk and British blood, his fight for freedom and justice will be … [Link]

An anonymous reader writes "Engineers at the University of Utah have designed a new kind of video game controller that not only vibrates like existing devices, but pulls and stretches the thumb tips in different directions to simulate various types of movement. 'We have developed feedback modes that enhance immersiveness and realism for gaming scenarios such as collision, recoil … [Link]

jfruh writes "Did you hear about the study from Microsoft and IDC (PDF), declaring that adoption of cloud technologies would create 14 million jobs? Well, don't believe the hype. The study posts that, once small and medium business can use cloud products to just eliminate their IT department, they'll use those savings to hire people for their core business. … [Link]

America's next stealth fighter has passed a key Pentagon test of its combat capability, allowing the nearly $400-billion program to move closer to full-rate production. But the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter cleared the mid-February review only because a Pentagon council agreed to relax the grading scale. That's right: the military helped the F-35 essentially cheat on its mid-term exam. … [Link]

With the aim of merging two iconic games, Stabyourself.net has created a pretty funky version of the classic Super Mario game that incorporates the puzzle game mechanics from Portal and it’s called Mari0.I’ve had a very quick play and it seems pretty funky. I didn’t actually get to any of the levels where you need the portal but I might … [Link]

New submitter SchrodingerZ writes "'The world's most precise measurement of the mass of the W Boson, one of nature's elementary particles, has been achieved by scientists from the CDF and DZero collaborations at the Department of Energy's Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory.' This new number (80387 +- 17 MeV/c^2) puts more constraint on the mass of the theorized Higgs Boson, … [Link]

kodiaktau writes "Slashdot founder and long time cat herder Rob Malda joins the Washington Post per an announcement today. According to the press release, he will be the Chief Strategist and Editor-at-Large working for WaPo Labs." Rob has a more detailed description of the job on his blog: "Don Graham is trying to accomplish something that is a bit … [Link]

An anonymous reader writes "The incredible demands of the Canadian music industry as it seeks a massive overhaul of Canadian copyright law continues. It is seeking increased liability for social networking sites, search engines, blogging platforms, video sites, and many other websites featuring third party contributions, plus a new iPod tax, and an extension in the term of copyright. … [Link]

The Trebucard is a business card sized mini trebuchet. It is designed to fire jumbo paper clips and uses 16 pennies as a counter-weight. Unlike a traditional trebuchet the Trebucard uses the surface it is resting on as a pivot rather than being mounted on a frame.This is a newer version of my business card that turns into a rubber … [Link]

judgecorp writes "The Institute of Advanced Motorists in the UK has carried out live tests which prove that using smartphones impairs driving ability more than drug or alcohol use, making reaction times 37.6 percent slower (PDF). The result is a big concern since a quarter of drivers admit to sending texts from their phones while driving. 'Young people have … [Link]

You know how they say trends loop around really frequently? Well remember the time when choose your own adventure games and moving gifs were all the rage? I believe (or at least wholeheartedly hope) that they’re making a comeback.Good ol’ College Humor has created for us a lovely little Choose Your Own Adventure that will turn the most mundane workplace … [Link]

At a time when the U.S. is cutting its defense budget by 2.5 percent, China?s far less advanced military is getting flooded with cash. Beijing announced that it will boost its annual defense budget to $106 billion, an increase of 11.2 percent. Cue the freakout ? from everywhere but the Pentagon. [Link]

wired_parrot writes "The international credibility of Australia's universities is being undermined by the increase in the 'pseudoscientific' health courses they offer, two academics write in a recent article decrying that a third of Australian universities now offer courses in such subjects as homeopathy and traditional Chinese medicine, which undermines science-based medicine. 'As the number of alternative practitioners graduating from … [Link]

Everyone remember when Matthew McConaughey was busted in Austin for playing the bongos neked? Well, CraftyIsCool has crocheted him in the buff, with just his bongos, and he’s spewing out cool advice for first-timers to SXSW! Want to know where to go or what to do in Austin? Check out Tolly Moseley interviewing McConaughey for Citysearch.com. #toomuchmirthforonedayRelated posts:Dating Advice for Gamers … [Link]

Ever wish you could have a fireproof and waterproof vault for all your precious data files? Well you can, with one of ioSafe's disaster-proof hard drives. What about the Cloud? Wait a sec, isn't offsite backup the hippest thing ever? Absolutely. Backing up to the cloud, using a service like iCloud or one of the many backup programs like CrashPlan, … [Link]

smoothjazz writes "Researchers describe a new, freely available Web-based program called Spliceman for predicting whether genetic mutations are likely to disrupt the splicing of messenger RNA, potentially leading to disease. From the article: 'Spliceman makes its predictions about mutations by calculating that distance. It has successfully predicted the known effect of many mutations. The software has genomic information about … [Link]

There is absolutely no proof that the United States (or Israeli) government was responsible for the Stuxnet attack on Iranian nuclear facilities. But a former CIA and National Security Agency chief says such tactics are a good idea and will now be considered legitimate.The Stuxnet virus spread worldwide, but turned out to be specifically targeted at a particular industrial control system … [Link]

The world of virtual band Gorillaz is hypercolored and surreal, like being in Alice's Messed-Up Wonderland. So for the video for the group's collaboration with LCD Soundsystem's James Murphy and Outkast's Andr? 3000, director (and Gorillaz co-creator) Jamie Hewlett had to bring his characters' bizarre universe into that of a real-world apartment. In this behind-the-scenes video, we learn how the … [Link]

The Pentagon's far-out research agency, Darpa, has just released a new video of their Cheetah 'bot — designed to mimic the rapid movements of cheetahs, the speediest animals in nature — absolutely killing it on a laboratory treadmill. [Link]

cylonlover writes "Scientists at Sandia National Laboratories have announced a breakthrough in prosthetics that may one day allow artificial limbs to be controlled by their wearers as naturally as organic ones, as well as providing sensations of touch and feeling. The scientists have developed a new interface consisting of a porous, flexible, conductive, biocompatible material through which nerve fibers … [Link]

Hugh Pickens writes "The NY Times reports that people who read ebooks on tablets like the iPad are beginning to realize that while a book in print is straightforward and immersive, a tablet is more like a 21st-century cacophony than a traditional solitary activity offering a menu of distractions that can fragment the reading experience, or stop it in … [Link]

When you use a regular alarm clock, it’s a total lottery whether it will strike when you’re at the end of a sleep cycle or in the middle of one.When you’re in the middle of a sleep cycle, you’ll find that you’ll wake up groggy and with that feeling of an anvil pressing you down, refusing to let you get out … [Link]

wiredmikey writes "Sony once again has found itself in the news surrounding another hacking-related incident. This time around, the breach doesn't appear to involve any lost user data or customer accounts, but instead, some valuable property owned by the record company. Today, several British news outlets have reported that more than 50,000 music tracks have been illegally accessed and … [Link]

cold fjord writes "The inability of the incompetent to recognize their own limitations is a story that has been covered before on Slashdot. But, what happens when you apply that finding to politics? From the article: 'The democratic process relies on the assumption that citizens can recognize the best political candidate, or best policy idea. But a growing body … [Link]

Ok, I know some of ladies have asked that I feature more male cosplayers on [GAS], so I decided to put this video up to satisfy your cravings. The video also features the lovely Tabitha from Artyfakes Action-Props, which we featured a few days ago for her amazing (but highly innecfective) dragonborn-like armor. I invite you all to check out … [Link]

MrSeb writes "Over the weekend, developer Egor Homakov exploited a gaping vulnerability in GitHub that allowed him (or anyone else with basic hacker know-how) to gain administrator access to projects such as Ruby on Rails, Linux, and millions of others. GitHub uses the Ruby on Rails application framework, and Rails has been weak to what's known as a mass-assignment … [Link]

This advert for the Guardian’s open journalism, screened for the first time on 29 February 2012, imagines how we might cover the story of the three little pigs in print and online. Follow the story from the paper’s front page headline, through a social media discussion and finally to an unexpected conclusion.[Via Neatorama]Related posts:Angry Birds vs. Three Big PigsHeartless: The … [Link]

A new company called NuCaptcha provides animated video captchas it says are much harder for OCR-based programs to crack than static captchas, but lots easier for humans to figure out. While at the 2012 RSA conference, Timothy Lord pointed his camcorder at NuCaptcha CTO Christopher Bailey, and had him explain how video captchas work and how the company makes … [Link]

James Ball sent me the data for the Russian election vote counts this morning and asked me to test whether it deviates from Benford’s law, a test that can give a hint at whether numbers are the product of fraud. Posted below is my analysis, and also a check for last digit preference, which is [...] [Link]

theodp writes "So, how does one search for images that aren't tagged with keywords? Google does offer its sometimes-spotty search by image, but what if you don't have an image handy that looks like what you're searching for? Microsoft, reports GeekWire, offers a solution that's 'a little like playing Pictionary with a search engine — drawing a sketch and … [Link]

Steve Herrod wants to put a virtual machine on your phone. Herrod is the chief technology officer at VMware, the company that reinvented the data center with virtual servers. But now it's trying to push virtualization technology onto tablets and mobile phones, and that includes the Apple iPhone. [Link]

MojoKid writes "Several months ago, AT&T notified customers that it would begin throttling network speeds for users who exceeded a certain threshold, with the definitive throttle point defined as an imprecise "the top 5% of mobile data users." The company has issued a statement clarifying this policy after irate customers with unlimited data plans demanded to know what the … [Link]

-A Closer Look At McDonald’s France’s “Dark Vader Burger” Last month, Quick (the European McDonalds), announced the launch of a burger in honor of Darth Vader. It’s been on sale in France for 3 days now, and here’s how it looks. Still wanna try it?-The Darker Side of Mario Mario has been given the horror treatment by artist MPuncekar, who takes … [Link]

angry tapir writes "An Oregon man has been convicted of seven courts of wire fraud for helping thousands of people steal Internet service. Ryan Harris, 26, of Redmond, Oregon, was convicted by a jury in U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. He faces a prison term of up to 20 years and a fine of up to … [Link]

PolygamousRanchKid writes "Iran is an earthquake zone, so its engineers have developed some of the toughest building materials in the world. Ultra-high performance concrete (UHPC) could also be used to protect hidden nuclear installations from the artificial equivalent of small earthquakes, namely bunker-busting bombs. UHPC is based—like its quotidian cousins—on sand and cement. In addition, though, it is doped … [Link]

inode_buddha writes "Randall Long, a senior attorney who led several antitrust investigations against Google, has been hired by Microsoft. From the article: 'The software giant told the Wall Street Journal yesterday that it hired Randall Long, an official at the FTC's Bureau of Competition. When he joins the software giant at the end of the month, Long will head … [Link]

First time accepted submitter saiful76 writes "Nearly half (46%) of American adults are smartphone owners as of February 2012, an increase of 11 percentage points over the 35% of Americans who owned a smartphone last May. Two in five adults (41%) own a cell phone that is not a smartphone, meaning that smartphone owners are now more prevalent within … [Link]